Echoup de théâtre: Cache
by Dthomin
Summary: -AU, Echo Series Pt.3- Ichimaru Gin is found on the brink of death. His will to live is rekindled when he focuses on an certain orange-haired teen he owes a debt to, helping him attain a power he never knew he had, changing both of their lives in the process. Thus the snake strikes again to set the stage for the absolute and horrifying truth. Future GinIchi, ML. Chpt. 4 incomplete.
1. Intro: Sputter

**A/N:** Welcome to part three of the **Echo Series** created by **Lenighma** and yours truly. The **Trial and Bonding** portion can be read from her profile, links are available on mine. I recommend you read the second part first, as the events are parallel to the beginning of this story. This is the first of the **Love and Treachery** portion, which is the second of the series.

You are welcomed to skip this portion if you have a problem with ML; ML stands for _Men's _Love. Simply put, this is NOT BL, _Boy's_ Love, or typical yaoi, but isn't exactly bara, either. Gin and Ichigo are not _bears_, for fuck's sake...

Like the previous parts, this story is told as an album (literally in song form) of events. The underlying theme of the series is echoes. Title is from "coup de théâtre", which means a sudden dramatic turn of events. A cache can mean a place for concealment and safekeeping, as of valuables.

This is a fanfiction site. Take a second to think of what that entails.

**Intro: Sputter**

* * *

His world, his most sacred place, shivered and fractured before his eyes. The cracks spread and cut into every impossible surface, even the very sky itself. Every move to turn caused a pain to spread through his being, leaving a horrible sensation in its wake reminiscent of pins and needles. Something, some outside source, was the cause of this pain within his soul, but he hadn't a clue as to what it could possibly be. He clenched his hand at his side, scanning his surroundings in agony and muddled clarity. Shinsō. Where was _Shinsō_? Then, with a feeling not unlike a physical pull, he was thrown from out of his disintegrating sanctuary and into the cold, cruel reality of the living world.

Eyes snapping open, he jolted forward with a choked gasp from the pain and rush of being forcibly removed from his inner world. His head hit back against the brick wall and he emitted a fierce shout, blood gushing from his mouth as the strange throbbing seemed to press against his chest. It became difficult to breathe, and his body trembled from exertion. More blood began to escape nearly every other orifice: his nose, ears, even his eyes. Through it all, he still couldn't distinguish the cause or origin of the pain. It was simply..._everywhere_.

A sardonic thought passed through the depths of his subconscious: what a perfect, pathetic end for a traitor. He had learned the depths of Hell were saved for traitors, and he wondered with a grimace of a bloody smile if there was enough room for him. He doubted the intentions behind his treachery were enough to spare him Hell and torture; he took lives, innocent and otherwise, betrayed and backstabbed, and merely smiled through it all. Regardless of everything he wanted, desired, and intended...he truly deserved no mercy.

As life slowly drained from him, he became aware his lifelong companion, Shinsō, was trying to reach him, but garbled sound resounded in his soul instead. He couldn't even sense his zanpakutō, and this deeply frightened him. But perhaps this was what death was, and though he was afraid, he had no choice but to accept. There was no reason to hold on...yet he continued to live.

_Why_, he wondered through the pain, _was_ he still alive? Why _was_ he still holding on, and how dare he? His lifelong desire had ended in failure, and only more suffering awaited him. Why was his body hurting him like this...? Why couldn't he die...?

It felt as if many years had passed since he first dragged his wretched body from the rubble he nearly died upon. Unable to move in his physical, and mental, condition, he continued to stare aimlessly at the emptiness that made up a dark wall before him. Then, what appeared to be a cloud of darkness literally moved before his bloodstained eyes, but he spared it no attention, or perhaps couldn't either way, caring not as to why it didn't continue moving on as the many others had for the past...years...?

This darkness, unnatural, as it couldn't be otherwise, continued to hover above him for a few minutes more before swiftly disappearing. Time passed impossibly slow, until yet another, larger shadow hovered above him as well. Though unable to focus, he then thought he heard an echo of some sort emit from it; someone speaking?

...But what was this? His body was being moved...carefully lifted and wrapped in a warm (so _warm_)...something...and into what could have been arms or something to lie on. He was placed gently onto his back, and continued to stare faintly at the darkness called a sky, watching with still, half-blind eyes as the dim scene before him moved; _he_ was being moved. That part of him so stubbornly holding onto life seemed to exhale with a yearning, welcomed relief. And following that exhale, he found his afflicted eyes unable to stay open any longer.

For the first time in too long an agonizing passage of time, just as he heard a voice clear as day murmur ringing words, his eyes closed, locking him behind a painful and dreamless slumber.

_"You're alive."_


	2. Dead, Died, Un?

**1. Dead, Died, Un?**

* * *

A pair of transcendental beings fought that day, on what was known as the Winter War. One fought with the conviction to prevent the other from destroying his home, all that he loved, and from succeeding to attempt what was deemed madness. The other sought to ascend to an even greater level of power, to destroy the very foundations of millennia-old beliefs, and with the intentions to prove something that went unknown to all but _one man_. That day, just one of these beings survived, only to play a pivotal in one of two events that were harbingers to yet another dimension-shaking incident.

Approximately two months and two weeks after the Winter War and Aizen Sōsuke's startling death, his executioner, the sixteen-year-old Vizard Kurosaki Ichigo, called out to his Hollow self-exiled in the depths of his soul. Simultaneously, under the cover of darkness, a Plus led a humble shopkeeper to the half-dead body of that _one man_ thought to have died during the War...

We come to that time, just under a mile from where Ichigo and Aizen encountered in Karakura Town, where Urahara Kisuke stared upon the body slumped against an alley wall. Infamous for his uncanny ability to _know _what normally went or should be unknown, Kisuke was not a man easily surprised. He could be considered a jack-of-all-trades in the world of supernatural knowledge, as there was much he knew, knew mostof the well-guarded secrets, and had all too many of his own. But one thing he had absolutely not foreseen, added to his calculations, or given idle speculation to, was the survival, slim as it was, of Ichimaru Gin.

The sly shopkeeper and former Gotei captain had been wondering about the town in thought. He pondered on Aizen's shocking death, the mere child who killed him, and the shattering of the artifact that likely started it all: the ever-evolving, spherical, ethereal, unbelievably near-sentient product of madness and genius known as the Crumbling Orb.

He was so deeply in his thoughts, he almost missed the quiet, childish sobbing emitting from a lone street he was just passing by. Turning to it, he saw the figure of a young female Plus huddled against the side of a building. After placating the child, crouched before her, she told him she was scared, and that she wanted to go home. As when he asked about her parents or family she only insisted on going home, he grudgingly decided to use a konsō to send her to the Soul Society. After briefly explaining it to her, the girl seemed relieved, and then asked him, perhaps he could help the bloody man in the alley, too?

That was how Kisuke found himself staring upon Ichimaru after completing the konsō.

At first, he didn't know what to do, eyeing the blood-splattered body and the broken zanpakutō on the ground, out of arm reach. Though he was not quite examining his body, if the severe wounds were any indication, it was obvious someone had purposely left Ichimaru to die a slow and painful death. The man was not conscious, though his eyes were partially cracked open, crusted with dried, blackened blood. If it weren't for Kisuke stepping close enough to be within arm-range, he never would have sensed the waning reiatsu or heard the soft, rasping struggles for breath emitting from the half-dead form.

He had mere seconds to come to a decision on what to do with the traitor. He could let him rot, as goodness knew it was a punishment well-deserved...or...he could throw caution to the wind and divulge in answers and explanations if he helped keep the man alive.

Decision made, he called for his companion, Tsukabishi Tessai, who traveled to his location upon a flying contraption and bringing along some blankets. Indeed, when Tessai lifted the dying Shinigami into his arms, he acknowledged the frail body was chilled to the bone. As they rushed to the Shōten, Kisuke stared at Ichimaru in wonder and endless questions bubbling to the surface of his mind.

"...You're alive," he murmured, to himself or to the man, he wasn't sure, just as the afflicted eyes slowly, almost mechanically, closed.

* * *

Yoruichi was both shocked and disturbed to see Tessai carefully carrying the bloody body of one of the Soul Society traitors in his arms and into the Shōten. Kisuke was the first to disembark, closely followed by Tessai, and words weren't exchanged between the three childhood friends, as each knew what to do. Regardless of whatever Ichimaru had done in the past, his life was their first priority. They swiftly entered a room rarely used, even by their many previously injured guests, fashioned like an infirmary. Tessai proceeded to prepare Ichimaru for a bath while Kisuke arranged a bed with IV hookups and drew some of Ichimaru's blood to cross-reference for transfusion. Within the room was a large bathroom, where Ichimaru's cold and blood-crusted body was thoroughly washed, and within, his ligament remaining from what was once a right arm, too severely ripped and infected to be healed, was removed.

It came as a thorough shock that Ichimaru's blood seemed compatible with...well, _anyone's_ blood. There was no time to ponder over what should have been an impossible feat, and it worked in their favor; there was no time to properly find a match for blood. Judging from the blood that was caked on Ichimaru's body and the dried, blackened pool that had surrounded him when he was found, there was more than enough blood to make up for what he had lost in the Shōten's very own blood bank, located in the back of the infirmary.

As the blood was warmed, Kisuke watched as Tessai attempted to heal Ichimaru with kidō and the latter breathed with the help of a simple face mask attached to oxygen-filled gas cylinders. There was a look of frustration and confusion on the former Grand Kidō Chief's face; though Ichimaru's reiatsu was weak, it was obviously there, and yet...he could not be healed. Something located within the center of his chest was preventing him from accepting Tessai's healing reiatsu. Left with no other choice, if they couldn't heal his internal wounds, he would have to heal the old fashioned way.

Once cleaned, bandaged, and dried–and by this time Ichimaru was barely holding onto life, his severely dwindling reiatsu a sign of his existence eroding away– he was transported onto a bed. As Tessai donned gloves and began to insert a catheter into Ichimaru's hand for his transfusion, Kisuke cleaned Ichimaru's skin over an area on his chest with iodine and prepared him for intercostal drainage. Once Tessai had him properly hooked to his IV, he and Kisuke watched with frowns at the blackened blood that drained from Ichimaru's chest into the collection chamber of the drainage canister. The liquid, regardless of where it was, should nothave been nearly congealed...

Finally, breathing with help from the oxygen, Ichimaru seemed mostly stable, and though his body was no longer as cold, he trembled with sickness. The entire process took over three hours, well into the night. By the time they finished and were sure Ichimaru was not going to die from his wounds, both Tessai and Kisuke were taxed and anxious. It was not easy to keep a dying man alive...

The first few days Ichimaru spent at the Shōten were wrought with exhaustion from his strange respiratory arrests, despite the oxygen he received, causing him to require mechanical ventilation; queries from his inability to be healed, inspiring Kisuke to begin the invention of an assisting device; and absolute horror as Ichimaru experienced violent attacks that sent his life-readings off the charts. On average, his reiatsu would fluctuate first, signaling the oncoming bout, then he would convulse intensely for naught but a few painfully long seconds before his eyes (_those _eyes) snapped open, and would begin to scream himself to bloody vomiting. Throughout it all, he was only given a small mercy, as regardless of his opened orbs and what his body did, he remained unconscious. Once the fits passed, he would return to a near-dead state, still as a cadaver, and his fading reiatsu would continue its steady, unnatural course.

It was primarily because of these reiatsu fluctuations that Kisuke took a deeper interest in his patient's condition. Obviously, it was worse than originally believed. Fortunately, he managed to cease Ichimaru's vomiting with the help of an anesthetic administered directly into his veins. Kisuke's quest for answers began with a few meager tests performed on his patient, nothing even remotely intrusive, and the results were as astounding as they were troubling.

Ichimaru bore four obvious wounds when he was found. The first was, of course, what was left over from his right arm; the skin, internal ligaments and bone from a quarter of his upper arm was broken and ripped as if the missing three-fourths were forcibly torn from his body. The second wound was a nasty gash running diagonally from his upper chest, narrowly missing his heart, to his abdomen. It was deep and clean, as if his flesh were butter to whatever weapon had cut him. It was some wretched miracle he wasn't cut in half, and somewhat of a shame he wasn't dead from it. The third was an even, concave wound in his stomach that ran clean through his body, undoubtedly the result of being impaled by a sword. It, too, should have been enough to kill him. The last wound, however...

Blood, crusted and abnormally dark, along with recent, viscous blood steadily discharged from his mouth, nose, eyes, and ears when he was found. At first, Kisuke suspected some of it could have been caused by the chest gash so close to his heart, but that was before the attacks began. As during the fits, pre-anesthetic, he secreted _and _vomited scores of fresh blood, it didn't take much for Kisuke to deduce Ichimaru's fourth wound was internal, and deeper than mere organs. His very soul was in shambles; something was killing him and the cause of his deterioration from the inside out...and even Kisuke couldn't come to a conclusion, sans deducing it likely had something to do with whatever was in his chest. He needed more samples...more backstory and information...but whatever the case...

Ichimaru's journey to recovery was an extremely long way off, if not, in fact...impossible.

* * *

He knew he was unconscious, but something was wrong. This expansive blackness...it was somehow unlike the darkness of dreamless slumber. It wasn't a dream, or a nightmare, as not only was he familiar with the sensations of both, but he couldn't see or feel his subconscious body. Slowly, an overwhelming pain crept up from within him, and he struggled between the feelings of sleep and awake, uncomfortable and terrified. He tried to call out for his zanpakutō, but heard nothing, not even what should have been his own subliminal "voice".

_...Gin?_

He tried to reach within himself, to grasp onto that comforting, sweet voice...

_Shinsō...?_

If the voice had responded, he couldn't hear it, as sound became distorted. A sudden jolt of fear and panic blossomed inside of him, causing the darkness to slowly ebb, and with a growing dread, he realized he was being forced into consciousness. The budding agony grew a tenfold, and he attempted to talk, but his voice came out as a strained, rasping choke as he faced consciousness head-on.

Shinsō. _Where was Shinsō?_ If he could not hear her in his soul, at _least _he could hold her sword form in his hand. His unfocused mind ran too fast even for him to comprehend, blinded by his desire, and he lifted a trembling hand while using every bit of strength he had to sit upright. Leaning forward, he nearly tilted off the side of the bed, unaware he had needles in his hand, a mask over his mouth, or pads on his chest in his incoherent state. He struggled to stand, too far gone to even register the pain caused by trying or the door opening.

_Where...? Where...?!_

Having only sensed his reiatsu spike, Kisuke nearly had a fright upon seeing the once so very still body of Ichimaru topple off the bed and to the floor. Ichimaru didn't even wince as the needles in his hand were yanked out, causing it to bleed. He reached out, grasping the wall with his only hand, and gasped for breath as he attempted to stand. Horrifying as the scene was, Kisuke stayed frozen for a moment, observing the blindly panicked expression on the albino's face...and his uncanny eyes, so disoriented and frightened...

"Sh...Shin...s-sō..." Kisuke heard him murmur, coughing and gasping to breathe on his own while stumbling against the wall. "Wh...whe..._where_...?"

Abruptly, a fierce spasm wracked through his body, and he slid down the wall as he convulsed, bangs slick on his forehead from sudden sweat. Shaken from his morbidly observant stupor, Kisuke came to his side and called for Tessai as he attempted to placate the sickly man. Tessai appeared in the doorway a moment later, awaiting orders.

"Can you please recover Ichimaru-san's zanpakutō and a glass of water?" Kisuke asked calmly, helping to move Ichimaru back into the bed.

Ichimaru didn't fight back, his eyes closed and struggling for breath, unable to hear speech above the thumping in his head and his disorientation. He was too weak to do much else, his movement alone taking all of the meager energy he had recovered from resting.

He was back in his bed when Tessai returned, entering the room with a cup of water in one hand and a familiar zanpakutō in the other. Kisuke thanked him as he took the cup, removing Ichimaru's breathing mask and placing the cup to his mouth. The moment the water touched his lips, Ichimaru began to drink greedily in large swallows, a sudden tremble causing him to choke. Kisuke rebuked him for his dangerously fast swallows, removing the cup so the man could inhale before allowing him to drink some more.

After he downed the cup, Kisuke replaced his mask and then gave the cup to Tessai, taking the zanpakutō in hand. "Why do you want your zanpakutō, Ichimaru-san?" he asked calmly.

Bleary eyes focused on the sword, Ichimaru breathed, "Soul...c-com...panion..." He arched back, grimacing and his eyes rolling backwards as his body abruptly jolted, coughing reddish speckles into the mask before going deathly still. Seeing _those_ eyes rolling into their owner's head was extremelyunnerving, and Kisuke reached over to close them.

Tessai was already adjusting their patient back against the mattress as Kisuke placed the wakizashi on the bedside table and examined Ichimaru's status. Yes, he was alive, but barely, which was no longer such a surprise. He was in a deep comatose state once again, his body shutting down from the intensity of his pain, or would have if it weren't for his defibrillator; Kisuke knew it would have come in handy sooner than later.

Once they had him stabilized, his mask cleaned, the IV replaced, and his hand treated and bandaged, both Kisuke and Tessai remained. They watched the supine form with shared interest and unabated worry that had shown itself since the younger Shinigami's very first attacks. There was no doubt about it. The only damage affecting Ichimaru were his internal wounds, and as of yet Kisuke was too wary of them to help. To repair that damage would mean messing about with properties he tried to stay away from after the incident over one-hundred ten years ago...Repair a soul...

The unsaid, rhetorical question hovered between them: what exactly was wrong with Ichimaru? With a soft sigh, as if the question had been asked aloud, Kisuke shook his head, vowing to find the answer to, at the very least, quench his own innate curiosity. That and...something else was nagging at him...

This was, overall, a most disturbing turn of events.

* * *

Since the beginning, the thought of being in danger was nothing short of a possibility to Kisuke and his companions, whether by order of the Central 46 themselves, or if something simply gave them the idea things were...amiss. They went about as if all was right in the world to keep their probable enemies closer, naturally, but remained inwardly cautious. They kept watchful eyes on the doings of the Soul Society, and the very Shinigami they had kept or occasionally had in their presence would also work as early warning systems. Such an alert inevitably came, though not from Yoruichi as originally thought it would be, but through the worry of the Kurosaki patriarch.

Roughly a month and some weeks or so after finding Ichimaru came the impromptu meeting with Kurosaki Isshin and Hirako Shinji in the Shōten. It hadn't come as a surprise when Isshin announced his intention to leave to the Soul Society; he was a Kurosaki, it was like them to do such things, and he was simply better off there for the time being for that same reason. But that was the sign, not just to Kisuke, but to all of the exiles and criminals, and the sign itself was no unexpected arrival to any of them.

...Of course, neither man —Isshin and Shinji— were aware of another guest in the Shōten, a criminal and outcast like them, though perhaps they thought they sensed something...

The very next day, the members of the Shōten relocated to the United Kingdom under the cover of darkness and in complete secret, courtesy of Kisuke's inventions and Tessai's use of forbidden spells. Similar to the Kisuke Shōten, the company's new house was also a store. Situated in a small Lancashire, England town, it was a sort of curio and candy store called the Back-Alley Shoppe. The building itself had been bought by Kisuke decades ago, but he never had much use for it until then. To keep up appearances, they "drove" to the building and familiarized themselves with the neighborhood that morning. One thing that was not a rouse, however, was their need to remodel the building from top to bottom.

They brought Ichimaru along, of course, to keep under their watchful eye. He was then, having remained comatose throughout the entire move, once more placed in one of the rooms fashioned into an infirmary. Since finding the traitor and witnessing his attacks, Kisuke had begun working on an invention that would allow him to see the inner workings of a soul, for instance how much reiryoku a konpaku possessed. In this case, he was intending to use it to see the spiritual damage of Ichimaru's soul; he may not be able to aid, but he may be able to lessen the severity of the attacks if he knew the cause. There was a room in the back of the house he designated for his inventions and scientific study, and there he created and tested his new contraption.

That early afternoon of their move, Yoruichi returned from the Soul Society with news of Isshin's imprisonment. She and Kisuke then briefly discussed what this could mean for Ichigo, as it seemed likely Shinji's fears would indeed occur. The possibility of the teen's life being in danger had suddenly increased a tenfold, a saddening and truly unfortunate development.

By the time it was late evening, the house's remodeling was half-complete and morale was high with excitement and anticipation. As the other occupants prepared for the first night in their new home, Kisuke visited the infirmary to assess his patient's condition. He came to the left side of the bed, reviewing the various monitors attached to Ichimaru's body by wires and tubes, and took notice of the once still eyelids beginning to flutter. As he seemed momentarily stable, perhaps Ichimaru was going to awaken peacefully this time around? Kisuke could only hope.

A second after the optimistic thought had formed, Ichimaru abruptly began coughing, and his hand grasped his chest as his body tensed. The monitor observing his heart and spiritual condition, abnormal as they were already, spiked. And then after a jolt of his body and a gasp, he went still and nearly flatlined yet again had it not been for his defibrillator. His breathing was sharp and erratic, but slowly evened out as his life support did its job. His abnormal readings, however, remained at their increased fluctuation.

Watching with a frown, Kisuke stayed motionless until the return of the steady, deep breaths. He then sighed, eyeing the steadily ascending and descending chest and the hand placed over it. The future scans would have to focus on that point, he mused to himself. After staying for a few minutes to observe and guard, he began to leave the infirmary.

He hadn't even walked three feet from the bed when he abruptly stopped in his tracks upon hearing whispered words. Spinning around, he strained his ears to catch what was being said.

Eyes still closed, the pale lips parted. "...Inside..." Ichimaru breathed, eyelids fluttering as if from a dream or nightmare. "...I...can...feel it..."

Kisuke's eyes narrowed. What...?

"...Rejectin'..." Ichimaru continued, his words slurred from quarter-consciousness. "...Don't...want it...'n...Shinsō..." He slightly shook his head, and then breathed deeply, going quiet once more.

...Curious little bout. Glancing briefly at the wakizashi placed on the bedside table, Kisuke hummed to himself, deciding to store this away for later consideration, and then left the room with only more questions thriving in his mind.

* * *

The next day, remodeling continued. Kisuke had just finished explaining Isshin's reasoning for allowing his imprisonment to Jinta Hanakari, carrying a box of miscellanea and walking past the doorway of the infirmary. Glancing in, he saw the uncanny eyes open, staring up at the ceiling. Pleased his patient had regained consciousness, and perhaps coherence, he intended to return and speak to him.

Ichimaru remained in the exact same position when he came back, though his eyes were closed, hiding their tint from sight. Unsure if he was asleep or awake, Kisuke approached, head slightly tilted to the side as he called, "Ichimaru...?"

There was no response at first, and he prepared to leave, but caught the pale mouth twitching just before he completely turned. Ichimaru then cracked his eyes open, just enough to see Kisuke's silhouette through vague vision. "...Urahara...Kisuke..." he murmured before letting his heavy eyelids close. Of all places to be...

"Gin Ichimaru," Kisuke greeted lowly, casually approaching the bed. There was a short silence before Ichimaru took in a long, deep inhale.

Following his exhale, he spoke again. "...Found me..." he said, continuing in a murmured voice.

Kisuke seemed indifferent at the statement. It wasn't surprising the younger man hadn't recalled that they had already spoken. "It wasn't intentional," he assured, sitting in the bedside chair. "If you'll believe it, a Plus found you and I was notified."

"Ah..." Ichimaru exhaled, "...yer speakin'...English..." His brow furrowed for a moment, from pain or confusion. "...We're...not in...Japan...?"

"Yes. We're in England," the shopkeeper responded, "North West of England, to be precise, in the county of Lancashire."

Ichimaru swallowed, making a soft groan. "...Lancashire..." he murmured, adjusting his tongue to English, a language he hadn't used in many decades. "...Where...?"

"In Lancashire?" Nodding in appreciation of his fluency, Kisuke glanced to the window to the far right of his patient. "The Wyre district. This isn't a location frequented by Shinigami or Hollows, as there aren't many spirit particles here, so it's quite safe," he explained.

There was a short silence between the two men, the only sound in the room the hiss of oxygen and the beeping of the monitors. During that silence, Ichimaru fully came to realize just whose company he was in...and that he didn't _seem _to be in any sort of danger. With a man like Kisuke, there could only be one reason for such generous mercy...

"...So...I suppose...ya want...me ta _talk_." He chuckled humorlessly, a light, strained sound, before murmuring, "I don't mind. No intentions...ta keep secrets...anymore..."

"What _are _your intentions?"

A small smile played on his face. "...Mn...wouldn't know...I thought...I died..." he said, eyes slightly opening, just enough to see their eerie, almost gleaming color. "...Wasn't plannin'...ta get this far..."

Surprised at this revelation, from out of his sleeve, Kisuke pulled out his signature fan and flipped it open to hide his mouth. He took a moment to process his thoughts. "...I'll get right to it, then..." he said softly. "Tell me everything, going as far back as to when and _why _you joined Aizen."

Ichimaru chuckled softly, amused by this request. "...My. This...is gonna be...a _long _story..."

* * *

Once Aizen's former accomplice, as from then on Kisuke silently considered him such, ceased speaking, it was late evening.

Kisuke had to give him credit; Ichimaru had indeed explained everything he had done in the past some-hundred years despite how obviously exhausted he was, seeming almost relieved to be telling his story. He only paused to take drinks of water Kisuke graciously provided. Even if he had an attack, and fortunately these were small ones, he only rested for a moment or so before continuing, his voice weary and strained. He began from the day he saw the three Shinigami and first laid eyes on Aizen, swearing to kill him, to feeling his vast reiatsu fade and cease to exist while dying in the alley.

When he spoke, the storeowner had assessed what was said with the acute ear of one personally familiar with saccharine words and corrupted aims, like those of Aizen's. Yet Ichimaru came across as quite legitimate, a young man who had done it all, and was merely awaiting the consequences of his actions. What he said _after _his initial explanation of catching Aizen's eye and being taken under his wing, however, caused Kisuke to remain deeply perturbed throughout the rest of story.

The Great Spirit Library...held such a secret? But it was not meant to be a secret, that is, not originally a secret at all, until the Central 46 appeared...? To even think it true was a struggle. _Horrifying_. No, these were blasphemous words, spewed from a radical...

"..._How_...can I trust what you say?" Kisuke asked slowly, his fan motionless in his hand. "Even if it were true..."

With a strained chuckle, the albino completely closed his eyes. "...I could care less..._what_ ya believe..." he said softly, his voice tired, "...I just...told ya the way it is..."

"Is there any way you can prove it?" Kisuke asked, closing his fan and leaning forward, curious in spite of himself.

The lapse of the medical sounds again filled the room as Ichimaru suddenly went silent. He seemed to be contemplating something from the past. "...Yea...but...can't show it now..." he finally answered, tone slowly drifting with uncertainty or fatigue. "...'M too weak ta even lift m'hand...But...all I wanna know is...are ya...gonna hand me over...?"

The younger man looked sicklier than usual, Kisuke noted idly as he sat back. To his own surprise, he had long decided what to do with the rebel, and so his answer was swift. "No," he responded, "I plan to do no such thing, I assure you. Regardless of...what you've told me...I have no intentions for you to be taken by the Gotei only to meet with death, as you would be executed, whether for your previous actions, your blasphemy, or both."

"...Hm..." Ichimaru scoffed softly, fighting sleep. "...Playin' the nice guy...eh..."

"Naturally," Kisuke acknowledged passively. He then went quiet for a moment as he thought of something. "...You will stay here. Under...town arrest, once you've recovered enough." _If _the man could recover enough...

Silver-white brows slightly furrowed at the unfamiliar term. "Town...?"

"Think it like house arrest," the storeowner explained, though he seemed distracted, "but limited to an entire town instead of a house." He had just made up the term, finding it suitable in this circumstance.

"...Ah." Ichimaru went silent for a moment, seeming to assess the situation. He then cracked a very small but unquestionably amused smile. "...Yer th' boss," he relented, now barely fighting to stay awake

With a contented hum, Kisuke stood. "Thank you for telling me your story, Mr. Ichimaru."

"...Pleasure..."

...He still sounded oddly amused, Kisuke noted to himself. "Get some rest," he said firmly, checking over the monitors and watching as Ichimaru exhaled deeply while going still. After a moment of observation, Kisuke turned and walked away, fanning himself. He left the infirmary, closing the door behind him, and only then did his expression turn serious as he narrowed his eyes in thought, walking slowly to the front of the house.

...Now...he needed to think.

_Carefully_.

Ichimaru's story was believable...from a certain perspective, and not a very probable one at that. However, considering the absurdity of the situation...and all that came from the previous events related to it...what he said could very well be the bitterly unadulterated truth. Kisuke would have to worry about that later, as, regardless, it didn't rule out the fact that he currently had a very dangerous, albeit weakened, true criminal under his roof. That was another worry; if it weren't for his current condition, if all he said wastrue, just how powerful was Ichimaru, really?

Something, what it was Kisuke had no idea, was not right with the present situation. Something was abnormal about young Ichimaru, in more ways than one; Kisuke couldn't deny that. In the end, he had only one choice. Gin Ichimaru was to stay as a resident of the Back-Alley Shoppe. All the while, he would be monitored for anything unusual, and Kisuke had a sinking suspicion the sly snake would have no qualms about that...

...Not after this...


	3. Won't the Dead Man Die?

**2. Won't the Dead Man Die?**

* * *

The early morning after Ichimaru's first coherent awakening, all was quiet in the seaside town. It was still some time before sunrise, and the only person not in bed in the Back-Alley household, Kisuke, dosed as he sat in his laboratory. He had finally finished his new invention, having stayed up all morning to complete it, spurred on by what he was told by the dying man in his care.

In the infirmary, said dying man seemed sedated and in deep sleep. His eyes were closed, his body still, and was breathing steadily with the help of the respirator. If one listened carefully, however, they would hear an increase of the steady breaths as they slowly became labored. The beeping of the monitors also accelerated...faster...louder...

-:Edth:C:-

The sky, black and cracked; the land, still seeming to disappear...This was his inner world, but it had dwindled greatly since this madness began.

Teetering on the long strip of land beneath a sky of darkness and twilight light emanating from around him, he felt as if he were in a nightmare, unable to recognize his own sanctuary. He looked up and down the trunk, and then began to run to the underside.

"Shinsō?" he called, a foreign tone of anxiety in his voice. "Shinsō!"

He jumped out to the twilight void, landing on another long trunk that began to grow from out of the surrounding sky, and looked around. There, much further beyond his location, he could see another extending tree trunk and what appeared to be a white being upon it.

"Shinsō!" he shouted, relief washing through his very soul. He jumped off the trunk, crossing the void, and his hand outstretched to his zanpakutō spirit.

_Gin...?_

But the world darkened before he could get closer, slowly swallowing him and taking the body of his companion away with the rest of the light. Terrified, as this couldn't be right, he found himself floating in darkness once more. The all-too-familiar agony crept up from within, and with a simultaneous scream from his own mouth and his zanpakutō's, merciless consciousness came upon him once more.

-:Edth:C:-

They came out of nowhere, the screams of bloody murder. Jolted from his nap, Kisuke jumped up and scampered to the source: the infirmary. He arrived at the doorway, but went no further in, frozen in shock, paling at the horrific scene before him.

One orb bled, the other poured reddish tears. There were no _eyes_, just white sclera with red veins within their pools. Every chest wound had reopened, bleeding, as were every orifice, creating a sanguine puddle around the bed. Ichimaru's skin was deathly white from the loss of blood, but his visible blue-green veins pulsed from his intense heart rate. His body had arched back, convulsing and limbs twitching with his mouth open and burbling with blood within the mask. Somehow, impossibly, his once so near non-existent reiatsu had spiked to the level of a Gotei captain...and was _rising_.

It was unreal, something out of a ghastly horror. The rapid, loud beeping in the room from the monitors only made the situation all the more so. Intently focused on the convulsing form, Kisuke didn't even notice Tessai, Yoruichi, Jinta, _and_ Ururu had approached from behind and were also watching in equal fright. But he fought through his horrified stupor, swiftly approaching the bed. The moment he reached Ichimaru's side, however, he stumbled, gasping in surprise as the unexpectedly powerful reiatsu pressed against him, as if trying to force him to the ground; behind him, Jinta and Ururu collapsed to the ground, choking. A loud, cringe-inducing ripping sound emitted from the depths of Ichimaru's body, and Kisuke removed his mask the moment the albino's intolerable, rasping scream filled the air.

Helpless, all Kisuke could do was hold him to the bed, as he had clawed at his chest and already managed to cause bleeding, deeply raised marks on his skin. Abruptly, a throaty, almost choking sound emitted from his mouth as he ceased arching. Instead, he desperately writhed for a moment or so against Kisuke's hold, then switched to jolting, and finally violently convulsed before going deathly still. The heart monitor's beeping droned, indicating a cardiac flatline, which seemed to snap Tessai out of his own stupor as he quickly approached. But Kisuke remained still, eyes focused on Ichimaru's limp head. He had a horrible feeling...

And just as he feared, the heart monitor beeped; the beginning of a steady pace. The man was still **alive**.

Jolting, Ichimaru coughed up blood as he struggled to breathe, eyes still rolled into his head, and his body only shuddering from the shock and strain as he slowly stabilized from the attack.

_Stabilized_.

...Why couldn't this dead man _die_?

Without waiting for orders, Jinta and Ururu, who had returned after being taken away by Yoruichi, slowly and soundlessly retreated from behind her. They returned shortly with mops, _BLEACH_, and more solution to clean the floor and bed. Yoruichi remained in the doorway, lips pursed in a frown as she watched.

Covered from mouth to waist in blood, Ichimaru only remained in the soiled bed long enough for his lungs to be cleaned before he was moved to a cot, and then stripped of his bloodstained clothes. While Tessai treated his reopened wounds, Kisuke cleaned the equipment, and the albino was put back on oxygen with a new mask. Once done, Kisuke came to Tessai's side as he examined the extent of their patient's worsened condition.

Ichimaru had screamed himself hoarse, his throat raw and larynx ripped. The stress on his eyes caused a vein in his right to pop, rendering him blind, and was thusly bandaged. His vomited blood was also abnormal, as both Tessai and Kisuke could see some clear substance in it when examined closely. When poked at, the substance retained its "shape", not fluid like the blood it traveled in, and had a very faint shine to it. And then, of course, there was the something within his chest, near his heart, that was still preventing Tessai from healing him internally. Whatever it was, it was foreign, powerful and had to be the cause of Ichimaru's condition.

This prompted Kisuke to briefly leave and make use of his new device. It was similar to an x-ray, a horizontal monitor on a wheeled, adjustable podium with a small keypad attached to its side. The monitor itself had a posable neck that could be moved in any direction and some distance from its post. Behind the monitor was what resembled ventilation holes. Rolling it to the side of the cot, Kisuke lowered the podium so the monitor was closer to the floor, and then positioned the monitor over Ichimaru's bare chest.

Tapping his chin, Kisuke's fingers hovered over the keypad. "...This is just a prototype," he murmured to Tessai, "but it should work..." He then typed in some keys, and the monitor blinked to life. Yoruichi, just as curious as they were, came over as they peered at the screen...

...and three hearts skipped two beats at the object embedded within the dead center of Ichimaru's chest.

_Spherical...shining...powerful...**DANGEROUS**..._

Blood drained from Kisuke's face for the second time that morning. "...Im...impossible..." he uttered.

"Then just what are we looking at...Kisuke...?" Yoruichi asked, though her tone was monotone with shock as he stared at the monitor.

Humming deeply, Tessai frowned. "...That does resemble...it...a bit much..." he softly commented.

Kisuke's expression went blank. Slowly, he sunk back, staring off at nothing. "..._How_ is it even...How _can_ it even..._Why_ is it doing this to him...?" he murmured to himself. His train of thought ran a mile a minute, sifting through various possibilities. "Though...perhaps..."

"Kisuke?"

He glanced up at Yoruichi, whose expression demanded answers. "...It's a part of him, now," he explained. "I'm...not quite sure..._how_ or _why _it's doing this to him, not yet, but this explains everything— his seeming inability to die despite all of his attacks and wounds, his ability to recover, albeit far from one-hundred percent..."

"So that _is_...it?" she asked, though it was more of a rhetorical question, as they all knew the answer.

Sighing, the storeowner shook his head. He looked both disconcerted and saddened. "...What else can it be...?"

The three remained still, watching the screen out of the corner of their eyes. What did this mean, and how the hell did it happen...?

After his wounds were treated, Ichimaru was bathed to remove the blood caked to his body, and once dried and dressed, was placed back on the cleaned bed. Once again he required the respirator and defibrillator, as he was in a coma and his body was unable to fully function on its own. He hadn't eaten since they found him, as during Kisuke's initial tests it was discovered he was unable to digest solids, and the condition of his throat and further deterioration of his insides only reduced the possibility of him eating anytime soon. However, with his reiryoku fluctuating so often, when low, as is usually was, he didn't require nourishment. There was also plenty of blood to go around, both within the blood bank and from the house's own generous donations, and, following the monitor's scan, the mystery of Ichimaru's "miracles" was solved. There was simply no such thing as being able to take all blood transfusions...

As his patient slept, and the household now fully awake, Kisuke inspected the unusual blood samples he had collected from Ichimaru's vomited blood. The small, iridescent clear particles couldn't be examined when removed from the fluid, as they would simply disappear into thin air. Those properties were similar to reishi...Could it be possible the particles were reishi, or something similar? Soul particles, perhaps; the "impure" form of reishi that made up a spiritual body...? It was only a theory, but if true, Ichimaru was dying, no matter what the entity within him did. It could heal the important organs, could keep him "alive", in the sense of just barely able to function, but he was regardless teetering on the precipice of death...

Kisuke's eyes closed, slowly shaking his head as he observed the blood in his lab.

...Such a cruel fate...

"So?" Yoruichi asked, standing in the doorway.

He sighed, motioning his hand over the bloodwork upon the table. "No matter how you look at it, Ichimaru is dying. He should have died, in fact, at least three times over already."

She furrowed her brows. "...Is there _nothing _you can do?" she asked, crossing her arms. "Can you even give him a coup de grâce?"

"...I'm honestly afraid to try. That might only bring him more pain, yet keep him alive..."

Wincing, the former Onmitsukidō commander shook her head and looked away. "Can't imagine anything worse than that..." she murmured. A golden orb glanced at him."...So what are you doing to do with him? It's likely he won't ever truly recover..."

"I see no dire reason why he can't stay. At least here, we can keep an eye on him..." Kisuke eyed the bloodwork, resting a hand under his chin as he murmured, "There's also the...well...those elements in his story..."

"...What about it?"

For the sake and probable necessity of keeping the more blasphemous elements away Ururu and Jinta, only she, he, and Tessai knew the entirety of Ichimaru's story. It wasn't to protect the children so much as to keep them from worrying, as the very possibility of the story being true was enough to cause chills down the adults' backs.

He turned to her, swiveling his chair around. "It's just a speculation, but what's happening to him may support it," he said, his expression grave. "Why else did it choose him when there were so many others we would consider ideal contenders at the time?"

* * *

Nearly a week had passed since Ichimaru's debilitating attack and the members of the Back-Alley household were told of his story. Since then, though not of the same magnitude as the former, his attacks continued their unpredictable cycle. He was incoherent if he came to any level of consciousness, and such an event only lasted a few minutes. Kisuke had come to the deduction the entity within Ichimaru's body was using him as a host, acting in the manner of a bastard parasite to drain him of his reiryoku and eat at his reishi to replenish its own "life force". Merely operating on basic necessity, it was likely the being didn't even realize what it was doing to its host...or maybe it did. All that could be done for Ichimaru was comfort him as he slowly, painfully, died.

During this time, regarding Ichigo's situation, Kisuke had planned to bring him to the Back-Alley for a much-needed discussion; of the horrible truth to his trial and how to avoid being led to his untimely death. Yoruichi was to assist, as someone adept with speed and espionage was required to carry out the plan, as well as Tessai for some spells. All they needed to begin was for the teen to wonder over where the Shōten was once located...which was easier said than done.

After failure upon failure, tweaking spells and attempting every inconspicuous cliché, it was only a day before the thickheaded teen's trial when he _finally_ came to realize something was leading him to the Shōten and the unusual energy emitting from it. From the other side of the spell, Yoruichi waited for the teen to appear in the foreign land. A ripple appeared in an alley, and out came Ichigo himself, blinking in confusion and glaring at the empty street with his zanpakutō in hand.

Yoruichi couldn't repress a small smile as the teen was just in the process of swearing when she knocked him unconscious. She held him up with a single arm to prevent him from hitting the ground, then slung him over her shoulder, took Zangetsu in hand, and returned to the Back-Alley Shoppe. When she arrived, however, she was greeted with anxious faces and disturbed frowns. The former was out of worry they wouldn't be able to reach the teen in time. The latter was because...

Ichimaru was missing, along with his zanpakutō.

Once the initial shock passed, she went off to hunt him down while Ichigo was placed on a mat in one of the many empty rooms in the back of the shop. He awoke shortly afterwards, dizzy from the blow to his head, and not in the best of moods. That passed once Kisuke became deadly serious, and thus commenced the continuation between former teacher and student.

Meanwhile, Yoruichi was led to Ichimaru's location with the help of a tracker Kisuke placed on him. The tracking device took the form of a small wristwatch, and it showed an accurate map of her position and where he was located. Initially, she was surprised at the distance he had traveled, as he was at the county's seashore, nearly upon the water itself. Intent on reaching him as soon as possible, she used shunpō to arrive at his destination in just a few minutes.

-:Edth:C:-

It was not easy to get out of that house, never mind the fact there was an inviting, open window within the infirmary itself. It was not from trying to safely unhook himself from the IV and safely remove the tube in his chest; that was easy once he was coherent enough to think. The struggle was to move on his own, to stand, to walk...His body felt lifeless and stretched so thin, a sensation that increased a tenfold once he actually made it outside. The light breeze of air seemed to pass through him, and sometimes it felt powerful enough to knock him over. Never in his life had he felt so debilitated. He knew he lost a substantial amount of body weight, and if memory served right, he hadn't eaten anything since he arrived in Kisuke's care, but...was his body really in such pathetic condition...?

Fortunately, his reiatsu was low enough that he remained undetected, and he was not in a gigai. Why Kisuke, intelligent a man as he was, hadn't used precautionary measures to prevent his possible escape was beyond him. Was it possible it was thought he wouldn't try to, or couldn't leave? His zanpakutō was even with him; he was surprised when he saw it right within some arm reach on the bedside table. But he was not cocky; he knew Kisuke's character too well to underestimate him, and the man probably knew he had escaped moments after he left.

So he didn't bother going far, having only intended to get some fresh air from the start. He pushed himself, using legs that hadn't been used in over a month in light flash steps to traverse the town until he made it to the seaside. Not sure just how far he had traveled, but unable to care, he rested against the low embankment, directly within the water atop an outcropping of rock, and let the cool ocean air clear his mind. Now that he was truly conscious, he came to realize some things...

He was _alive_. Alive, that is, to the extent that he could think, could feel, could breathe, could move...Why? He recalled the conversation with Kisuke, but scarcely remembered consciously speaking to him. That memory seemed almost as if he had run on autopilot, answering questions like an automaton and saying basic command functions. Curious. His last vivid recollection was when he was in the alley, fading, welcoming death, and saddened when death did not take him. His hand traveled idly to his zanpakutō, grasping it, frowning as it, too, felt...lifeless.

_Shinsō..._

He did not want this. He didn't want to be alive. This wasn't what he had intended to happen; he remembered saying such to Kisuke. He didn't think he would see "after" Aizen's death, nor had he wanted to. It was always his intention to kill the bastard and die with him, never to live afterwards. Only more pain, more suffering, and more chaos awaited him, now. At the dull throb in his chest, he grimaced. And this thing within him...Now it prevented him from dying. Even if he wanted to, even if he so desired...it wouldn't answer his pleas until after it was done with him...

He exhaled heavily, daring to attempt to enter his inner world, but the real world spun instead, causing him to groan and grimace from the pain. More than anything, his desire to converse with his zanpakutō, and the inability to do so, was the most distressing. During the many long years under Aizen's influence, in the man's presence and acting by his side, she was the only reason he stayed remotely sane...She was his pillar of strength, his soul companion, his dearest friend...

_Why...?_

-:Edth:C:-

Yoruichi watched him at a distance. She, like Kisuke, was a little more concerned he would hurt himself than threaten others. There was just something about him that conveyed disinterest in such things...for the moment; she was well aware how dangerous and unpredictable he was. She tensed upon seeing his pale hand grasp his zanpakutō, but quickly realized he was lamenting his inability to converse with it. There was a sadness that surrounded him, and, though abated, anger...and hate. He otherwise seemed asleep, leaning against the embankment and body limp as each breath for air caused him to slightly tremble with effort.

...Such a mysterious man...

"Yer presence...seems obvious ta me," his voice startled her out of her thoughts, "which is strange...considerin' who ya are, Shihōin."

She made a low scoff, though a small smile was on her face in appreciation of his senses, and appeared at his side in midair. He briefly glanced up at her with a smile, undamaged eye slanted open.

"...Just wanted some fresh air," he explained innocently, bangs in his eye as the breeze played through his hair. His voice was strained and low, nowhere near the playful tone he was so known for, but at least he could form words (even though he shouldn't have). "Wasn't plannin' on...runnin' away fer real. My mind...ain't _that_ messed up."

She leaned back against the embankment, watching him while crossing her arms. He was still sickly pale; his body, sharp and skeletally as it was, seemed slightly more eerily fragile, yet here he was, having made it such a distance from the shop. It could only be the entity within him allowing him to manage these otherwise impossible feats in his condition. "I'm surprise you managed to move at all," she said, "especially after that bout."

His smile slightly faltered, and she would have missed it had she not been watching his face. "Ah. I...kinda remember that. Not...pleasant," he said softly, massaging the center of his chest in small circles. "I was tryin' ta enter my inner world when that happened...I think. Maybe this...thing...within me don't like that."

Her brows furrowed. So he already knew it was in him... "Why would it?"

"Mm, dunno. Maybe it sees it as...recovery." He made a slight grimace, and she could have sworn his reiatsu spiked for just a second. "...After all...keepin' me alive's different...than lettin' me...recover..." he said, his voice lowering to a strained murmur. After a moment of silence, he stopped massaging his chest, clenching it instead as he moved off the embankment, moaning softly.

His reiatsu was definitely spiking this time. As he was clearly on the verge of another attack, she took him by his shoulder to help him stand. "Next time, if you want to leave the house, don't go so far away," she chided gently, distracting him from the pain she could see causing his trembles to worsen. He merely gave a light, strained chuckle in response.

Taking his arm and slinging it over her shoulders, she ignored his attempted protests and brought him to his feet, but his legs gave out and he nearly fell into the water. Frowning, she hoisted him up and into her arms, startled by his light weight, and went into lightning-fast flash steps to return home.

His coughs had died down, though he was having some trouble breathing and was nearly unconscious when they arrived at the shop. Still able to sense Ichigo inside, she carried Ichimaru through the house, but avoided the room the teen was in. With any luck, Ichimaru's reiatsu was too low and Ichigo's senses weren't so adept that he would become aware of his presence. She spotted Ururu in the kitchen and beckoned her to follow with a tilt of her head. The girl tailed her as she entered the infirmary, disturbed at the wheezes for breath coming from the albino in her arms.

She placed him on the bed, hooking him to all of his life support and stabilizers as she addressed the girl. "I need you to watch him until he's stable," she said, focused on pale man and his eye as it blinked in and out of consciousness. "Can you do that?"

"Of course, ma'am," Ururu replied, assisting with placing the pads on the man's chest as Yoruichi worked on the ventilator, having seen it done many times by now.

Before Yoruichi could thank her, Ichimaru began to violently convulse.

-:Edth:C:-

He startled upon finding himself in the familiar landscape of his sanctuary. Every day of the past some-hundred years since he joined Aizen and since he first conversed with his zanpakutō, he would visit this place. A day going by was too long a time since he last saw his companion, and so it dawned upon him with a rush of relief and worry when he realized he had returned to his inner world. Almost everything seemed right with the world, as more trunks were visible, the sky wasn't black, though there were still cracks in every impossible surface...

...Where was Shinsō?

His inner world appeared as open twilight sky filled with enormous, horizontal tree trunks stretching out for as far as the eye could see. Growing from the trunks were branches, though some were so twisted, unique and varying in size, they were almost exactly like huge trees, themselves. These "branches" were abundant with vegetation, some so densely packed, they could hide something quite large within their canopies...

Though he couldn't see her, for the first time since he arrived in Kisuke's care, he could sense her presence, yet unable to pinpoint just where she was. He took a few steps forward, scanning the horizon for his zanpakutō, and then rushed to the curve of the trunk's underside, looking down to the endless scape of sky and tree below.

"...Shinsō...?"

Silence met him, and he closed his eye, exhaling softly.

A familiar, feminine chuckle was made close to his ear, and before he could react, he was pushed off the side of the trunk. At first startled, the realization slowly set in. He smiled, turning around so he was falling back, looking up at his companion.

Shinsō was a sight to behold, a leviathan of a white serpent with red eyes and long silver hair along the sides and underside of her body. Head and tail hanging lazily off the side of the tree trunk, she looked down at him with a playful twinkle in her dark eyes, showing the hornlike protrusions over each.

Chuckling, he flipped so he landed on his feet upon a lower trunk, continuing to look up at her. "Shinsō," he repeated, relief heavy in his voice and his smile fond as he opened his eye.

"Greetings, Gin. It's been too long since we last spoke," she said, though her mouth remained closed, tongue flicking out instead. Her voice, whispery and low, was devoid of the acerbic bite he was used to. "Did you miss me?" she asked teasingly.

Though he knew the question was rhetoric, he answered, "Thought o' ya every wakin' moment, partner. Was real uncomfortable not bein' able ta hear yer voice in m'soul."

Humming in appreciation, she stretched down to one of the other trunks to approach him. "You're conflicted, Gin. Your soul screams in anguish, like a child throwing a tantrum," she said, though her tone was still playful. "Do you feel...wronged?"

Slowly, his smile devolved into a thin line. She went straight to the point, unlike what he tended to do. "...I'm alive. 'Course I feel wronged..." he murmured softly, pain clouding his expression. "Now we're both hurtin', an' in ways...in ways that shouldn't even be possible. Don't ya feel wronged?"

She was atop the trunk directly above him now, looking down at him. Her large, unblinking orbs met his, so alike each other, yet so different. And, like his, they were akin to an open window, allowing him to see the shared pain she carried in the depths of her being. "You know," she said simply.

He broke contact with the sanguine eyes, looking away. "...There's nothin' fer us," he murmured. "Better off dead, an' ya know it."

"Then why are you holding to life, now?" she asked harshly, the familiar bite returning to her echoing voice. "What drives you?"

Shinsō. Truly a snake tongue. Harsh, unrelenting...

Quiet, he seemed to ponder for a moment. He then shook his head, closing his eye. "No. There's nothin'..."

"A debt, perhaps?" she asked smoothly.

"There's nothin', Shinsō," he persisted with a soft hiss.

She made a sound of indifference. "Gin," she began, but suddenly they both trembled from a spasm, breaking into screams of pain.

_No! Not again!_

Once more, the world began to tremble and quake, and the disintegration of his sanctuary continued. On his knees, clenching his chest, he saw Shinsō falling back from the tree trunk as it disappeared. Their eyes met again, and he reached out to her. "Shins—!"

He cried out, falling as the trunk disappeared beneath him, and was once again forced into consciousness.

-:Edth:C:-

Jolting awake, he saw the worried face of the girl, Ururu, sitting in the bedside chair. Ignoring her, he grasped at his chest as it stung, murmuring, "Shinsō..."

"_I'm here,"_ whispered the indistinct voice in his soul.

Though his body wracked with small convulsions, he could sense this attack wasn't going to increase much more than its current intensity. That didn't explain why he was thrown from out of his inner world, or why _it_ hurt _her_ as well. His fingers massaged the center of his chest, and he grimaced in discomfort, closing his eye.

Sound was watery and garbled, so he only thought he heard Ururu speak to someone, and then the squeak of the chair as...perhaps she moved? He focused on remaining conscious, guided by the faint but comfortingly calm voice of his zanpakutō.

Once the pinpricks and quavers passed, his breathing was labored. His hand rested limply on his chest, eye half-closed as he recovered. He wasn't sure how long he laid there, motionless and half-awake, before he took notice of a familiar figure passing by the foot of his bed to come around to his left side, checking his condition. It was then he slowly brought himself back, fighting through his hazy mind and the ghost pains to address the man now beginning to walk away.

Though severely weakened, and sans his hearing and sight on occasions, his remaining senses stayed strong. While approaching the shop with Yoruichi, he took notice of the unusual reiatsu that belonged to one young male Kurosaki. The reiatsu brought back memories, causing old emotions and locked away thoughts to return to him. And then something new: he was strangely curious to know how the teen fared in the past few months. How had killing Aizen affected him? Were his heart and mind still stoutly resilient? What was he doing now...?

Kisuke was just a step from the doorway when he heard the faint murmuring of his name from behind. Turning, he met the dim but unusually attentive slanted eye, as if its owner had something he wanted to know, questions of his own. "Yes, Mr. Ichimaru?"

Ichimaru fought to keep his eye slanted open, as he was obviously fighting sleep. "...Ichigo..." he murmured, and his heavy eyelid closed nevertheless. Taking a deep breath, he continued, "...Is he...alright?"

Kisuke frowned, finding the question odd. Why would he care...? "His powers will soon leave him, as the technique he used to defeat Aizen was fatal to them, and his life is currently in danger. Tomorrow is the day of his trial before the Central 46," the shopkeeper explained, walking further back into the room. He then sighed, his expression grave at the reminder. "...I believe tomorrow's outcome will not be in his favor..."

"They're...gonna...kill 'im?" Ichimaru asked, a slight trace of disappointment in his voice.

"...I'm afraid they might," Kisuke admitted softly. Though there was a plan in place, nothing was guaranteed. There was also the unlikely but unknown possibility Ichigo's own episodes could kill him.

Long had the scientist found a connection between Ichigo and Ichimaru's attacks. It wasn't mere coincidence their souls were in such debilitated conditions, and if Kisuke's hypothesis was correct, the teen could have been in the same situation Ichimaru was in...

Blinking out of his thoughts, he realized the albino had fallen asleep once again. After eying the zanpakutō in his lap, the shopkeeper flipped his fan back over his mouth and silently retreated from the room.


	4. Interlude I – He, Too, Shall Live

**3. Interlude I – He, Too, Shall Live**

* * *

The next early morning, Yoruichi left for Karakura Town, as it was the day of Ichigo's trial. That feeling of something going wrong, nothing being guaranteed in spite of the plan they devised, had increased a tenfold since she left. Kisuke had the strangest harrowing feeling there was something they didn't know that would be a deciding factor in the success of the plan. This was just too easy...

Many hours after Yoruichi had left, Kisuke was alerted by yet another device hidden on Ichimaru that was only to activate in the event the man left the house. When he arrived at the infirmary, however, he saw Ururu looking out the window. The bed on which Ichimaru slept bedded wire leads, pads, and the oxygen mask instead of his body. All of the equipment was shut off. He immediately figured Ururu had let him go, and stood idly in the doorway for a minute or so. He remained calm, knowing that, although ditzy, the girl would only do such a thing if she had a legitimate reason. And a legitimate reason she had...

-:Edth:C:-

_The girl froze in the hall. Slowly, she turned to her left where the slanted eye watched her from within the room._

_Unlike Jinta, who generally avoided the infirmary as if it housed the plague, Ururu Tsumugiya wasn't hesitant to approach Ichimaru. The one thing that frightened her about him, however, was his strange aura. Somehow, though she knew he was a Shinigami, he felt somewhat...off; sometimes, he felt powerful in a distantly familiar way, sometimes, he felt foreign..._

_...but it was something entirely different to see him moving on his own, especially in what was clearly the motion to leave the infirmary through the window._

_Caught red-handed, Ichimaru simply stared back at the girl, standing before the window with his zanpakutō in hand. In the second he had sensed the girl approaching, he decided he could do one of two things before she came into view._

_He could cast Hakufuku on her, but it would be unwise to "attack" the girl. He could _immobilize_ her, but that went with the former option. Or...he could just try to..."appeal" to her._

_He went with the latter._

_"...Ururu," he nearly sang, smiling deeply, "I won't tell if ya don't."_

_At this, her eyes slightly widened and she nervously grasped at her dress. That could have been a not-so veiled threat. "...Um...I don't—"_

_"I've got ta go, ya see," he interrupted, glancing out the window, but keeping the girl in his peripheral vision. "Today's the day y'all were plannin' fer Ichigo ta leave Karakura Town, right? Well, that ain't gonna work. The Secret Mobile Corps probably got to 'im already."_

_The girl's lips parted as she was either about to say something, or, though it was somewhat hard to decipher with her vague expression, in slight surprise. She then glanced away, blinking in thought. "...You want to...help Ichigo...?" she asked carefully._

_Instead of answering, he simply grinned. "Y'all didn't plan this very well," he playfully scolded._

_She met his unseen gaze once more. At first, she was going to risk it and alert Kisuke, in his lab, or Tessai, somewhere outside. But then she realized...Ichimaru's eye. _

_To his surprise, she slowly stepped into the room, her posture nervous and he could practically feel her tension, but her gaze was keenly focused on him. As she did, he seemed to take notice of what she was doing in a heartbeat, as his grin was replaced with a smile, which slowly dissolved into a thin line the closer she came._

_Soon they were just a few feet apart, and his expression was void as he looked upon her. With a child's curiosity in her voice, head tilted to the side, she softly asked, "May I see your eye, sir?"_

_But he knew she knew. It wasn't too much of a surprise, when he thought about it; children usually noticed things that the mind of an adult could only realize at the last moment. She wouldn't be too much different, if not better..._

_Though he would later analyze his action after she spoke, in the moment, he couldn't help himself. A smaller smile, more serene, but no less eerie, spread on his lips._

_And his eye completely opened._

-:Edth:C:-

As Kisuke looked out the window, watching a garganta close in the distant sky, he considered this enigma that was Gin Ichimaru. Dangerous; he had indeed threatened Ururu. Uncanny; how in the world did he manage to unhook himself for the second time? And then, of course...

...who would have initially guessed _that _was the reason why he kept his eyes hidden from the world...?

* * *

On the border of Naruki City and Karakura Town, Ichimaru stood on a street pole, eyeing the streets in the far distance. His usual smile was upon his face, eye slanted in the manner that gave him one of his most common nicknames, "fox-face". Shinsō hung from the belt about his waist, and his fingers idly caressed her hilt. He was still wearing in the white yukata Tessai had dressed him in, and wore bloodstained, once-white sandals, the very same sandals he wore when Kisuke found him in the alley...It came as a slight shock that he found them at all...

Today, his thoughts revolved around one young man. To his surprise, he awoke feeling oddly disappointed and conflicted. So much he tried to ignore was facing him head on, just by simply existing. At the thrum under his fingertips, he tilted his head to the side.

_"A debt, perhaps?"_

The words of his zanpakutō came to the front of his mind. He hummed softly in dismissal, but they lingered.

The thought of owing a debt irked him. Everything he did in his life he had accomplished on his own, through many sacrifices and the loss of many lives. "Help" and "assistance" weren't in his vocabulary, not in that way. Yet how easily did he require that mere _child's_ help that day, the day all he had done was meant to come to fruition? And so this child, this young man, was the subject of his thoughts. In this situation, to eliminate the ties that bound him to another and rid him of this nagging sentiment, he was to resort to a foreign tactic: assistance.

He had gone over the ways he could do such a thing, filtering through his knowledge. Whatever Kisuke and the others had planned for Ichigo was not going to work, not as long as the teen carried his badge; he meant to say something of it the day before, but had fallen asleep before he could remember to do so. Everything they ever said, anything Ichigo ever did, was all overheard by the Gotei. He thought otherwise in the beginning, but bearing in mind the captain who authorized the badge's functionality, Ichimaru was quite sure not even Kisuke fully understood its true nature.

His eye slanted open as he saw another Hollow appear from out of a garganta. Something was indeed amiss. Such a fact wasn't obvious by the over-abundance of Hollows or black flits that were the Onmitsukidō troop about. Even at his distance, the massive reiatsu of Kurosaki Ichigo fluctuated in and permeated the air. With such abnormal fluctuations, his reiatsu was on the brink of waning to nonexistence. It would be a terrible time for him to enter a fight, which would be ideal for whoever was sent to kill him.

With an audible sigh, Ichimaru unsheathed his zanpakutō and disappeared from immediate sight, using shunpō to reappear some distance on the ground, and sped into the fray. He took advantage of the Onmitsukidō troop's distraction with the Hollows to easily slip past them, though if any were in his path, he didn't hesitate using Shinsō to forcibly remove them. He would wait until there were no other witnesses, then appear behind them and cut their jugulars. But he had to be fast, pressuring himself with flash steps to remain out of sight, out of mind...

Just a few miles out from his initial starting place, his chest began to burn, and he ignored it, continuing to breathe from his nose to slightly ease off the pain. He reached out with his senses to the distance ahead, the source of Ichigo's reiatsu, and frowned upon sensing the Gotei 13's 2nd Division Captain Suì-Fēng near him. In the teen's condition, someone nimble with a two-hit deathblow was his perfect adversary. Scoffing softly at the thought, Ichimaru dodged behind a tree, nearly catching the eye of an Onmitsukidō trooper. His back to the trunk, he took this moment to catch his breath, slightly grimacing while the burning in his chest increased. He then disappeared, overexerting himself to use superbly fast shunpō and reappear behind the trooper. The man didn't even have a chance to orient his location before falling to ground, head nearly cleaved off. Reappearing on the ground again, Ichimaru pressed on.

This continued —dodging, weaving, and killing— as he approached Ichigo's location. And as he continued to use shunpō and exert himself, the weaker he became. Soon, he was nearly upon the teen, and the abrupt raise in Ichigo's reiatsu nearly blew him off his feet. He steadied himself, stopping only to reorient his bearing and rest against a tree. Panting, his brow furrowed as he took this into consideration. It felt as if Ichigo had gone into bankai, something unnecessary if the teen were at his normal level of strength. Grimacing, his slanted eye glanced up as an Onmitsukidō trooper spotted him. Quickly, even for one in his condition, he shifted, planting his feet firmly on the ground and thrusting his arm forward as Shinsō shot out to impale the man in the dead-center forehead. As the dark-clad figure fell to the ground, he dashed away, pressing forward.

By the time he arrived at what was left of the verdant and land where the fight was occurring, he could only sense Suì-Fēng. Ichigo was still fighting, but Ichimaru had lost his reiatsu shortly after sensing him use bankai. Fortunately, there were no Onmitsukidō troopers in the area, likely because of Ichigo's high reiatsu and how senseless it would be for anyone _not _captain-class to fight against him. Practically wheezing from overexertion, Ichimaru held Shinsō limply in his hand and leaned against a tree once more to stabilize. Giving himself a mere second of respite, he took a few more flash steps forward, only to abruptly halt and collapse to his knees. The merciless force of dark reiatsu overwhelmed him, and with a wide eye upon hearing the wailing Hollow cry, realized it belonged to none but Ichigo. With a grimace and a bloody cough, he forced himself to his feet and continued.

Just abruptly as it came, the reiatsu disappeared, causing him to stumble. He could see Suì-Fēng's prone form at his distance and the Arrancar-like being that was inevitably Ichigo if the orange mane was anything to go by alone. Watching Ichigo go still and fall forward, he paused, slightly opening his eye. For a moment, and being unable to sense him making it seem all the more likely, it seemed almost as if the teen had...died. The very possibility was enough to spur him on; he rushed towards the fallen body, and had just the mind to sheath his sword, much as he wanted to run it through the woman, as Suì-Fēng readied the death blow.

He appeared behind her, so close he was practically talking in her ear. "...I wouldn't do that~"

She froze and swiftly spun around, but he nimbly danced out of her sight. That was barely necessary, however, as she collapsed to the ground, pushed to her limit. To keep her there, he quickly raised his reiatsu, focusing it on her, and she once again began to choke from the overpowering pressure. While she struggled, he glanced over Ichigo's body. The teen was bleeding rather heavily, even from his mouth, and the telltale butterfly symbol in the center of his chest indicated where he had been stung.

"Ah..." Frowning, Ichimaru looked down upon Suì-Fēng's shuddering form, moving to stand in front of her. "So ya really tried ta kill 'im after all," he mused aloud.

She couldn't even look up with the tremendous pressure upon her. "Y...you..." she began weakly, her voice barely a whisper, and she tried to move her head, but to no avail.

Seeing her so weak and helpless caused a soft chuckle to escape him. The new Central 46 severely underestimated the teen if they thought he was so helpless she would be enough to defeat him. As she was no longer a threat or of interest, Ichimaru cast Hakufuku, slightly grimacing when the feat stung, before coming to Ichigo's side. "Bye-bye~" he chirped, ignoring her. When she went still behind him, he let off his reiatsu and kneeled beside the teen's body, only to nearly keel over.

Grasping his chest, he grimaced, trembling with pain. Every inch of his body felt alight with a tingling, burning flame, and his vision slightly blurred, but he fought against unconsciousness. He had pushed himself far beyond his limits, today...

"Ichimaru?"

He shook his head. "I'm...fine...Shihōin..." He smiled weakly at Ichigo's unconscious form, Yoruichi's figure appearing by his side. "...We need...ta get 'im home..."

Though she frowned, surprised he was even there, she briefly scanned his shaking frame before looking over the teen's body. He may have carried shallow wounds, sans the stab in his chest, but she saw the fight at a distance, so knew most of Ichigo's wounds were internal. Lips pursed in thought, she observed the three incapacitated bodies around her and shook her head. Suì-Fēng would be all right; her troop was approaching, alerted by her initially fading reiatsu. Ichigo's condition was unknown; he needed to be examined and immediately placed back in his body. Ichimaru, on the other hand...

Before she had the chance to form words, Ichimaru softly chuckled, head lowered and breathing with great effort. "...Well...guess we're...equal, now...Ichigo-kun," he murmured to the unconscious teen in Japanese, as if he could be or might be heard. "Ya killed Aizen...and I saved yer life..." He swayed on his knees, but didn't fall over.

Narrowing her eyes, Yoruichi watched this one-sided conversation with interest. So that's what this was all about. "How did you know...?" she asked, kneeling to lift Ichigo into her arms.

Ichimaru heaved a sigh, grimacing, and slowly stood up. "...Urahara," he responded softly, eye still slanted, but his smile was gone and there was a noticeable sheen from sweat upon his skin. "I meant...ta tell y'all yesterday...but ya gotta get rid of his badge." He ran alongside her with shunpō as they left the area, ignoring his protesting body.

"...Why?" she asked warily, Ichigo slung over her shoulder.

Ichimaru spat out blood, brows furrowed in disgust as he ran. He really was getting tired of tasting his own blood. Normally, such a thing meant he was against a powerful opponent, something rare and honestly quite exciting, but this was a different circumstance entirely. This meant weakness. This meant inability.

Placing his hand over his chest, feeling an attack boiling within him, he glanced at her. "...The Gotei...uses that ta monitor 'im. Whatever plan...ya had...didn't work, right? That's 'cause when y'all...were discussin' what to do...they overheard everythin'," he explained at her question, continuing to speak in a slightly strained tone and murmured voice.

Though looking forward, she stole a few furrowed glances into his direction. That explained why he came in spite of his condition. "...Sounds possible," she acknowledged without a hint of hesitance, as such was true, "but how do you know this?"

This brought back the full-force of his signature smile, eerier than ever with his sickly appearance. "I got my ways o' knowin' things...~"

She made a wry expression, glancing at him once more, and was about to speak when they both suddenly stopped, eyes focused ahead. A Shinigami was approaching their exact location. Ichimaru didn't wait to be told, quickly dashing away whereas she remained impassive. Seconds after he left, the advancing Shinigami spotted the orange amongst the green and appeared before her. Safely at a distance in the branches of a heavily vegetated tree, Ichimaru observed while she began to talk to the older man he immediately recognized to be Isshin. His smile then widened as the teen was taken into his father's arms and warmly embraced before both disappeared from sight.

"...Aw," he murmured, leaning back. The trickle he felt down the side of his mouth was inevitably blood. He finally stopped fighting his body, causing his vision to swim, every muscle in his body to violently spasm, and his head to throb. Struggling for an inhale through his stinging chest, he gasped, "I think...I s-saw...some...th-thin'...r-real...rare..."

Eye rolling back, he fell over, out of the tree into Yoruichi's waiting arms.

* * *

She came to, eyes fluttering open the second she regained consciousness. Though her mind was slightly hazy, having trained herself, she immediately observed her surroundings. Upon recognizing her location, however, she merely sighed, causing her silent bystander to grace her with a small smile.

"Welcome back, Fēng-taicho," Unohana Retsu greeted warmly. She stood beside the bed upon which her patient laid in, arms hidden in her bellowing sleeves.

"...Unohana-taicho," Suì-Fēng said, "how long have I been asleep?"

"Only a few days. How do you feel?"

Brows furrowing, she growled, "As if I've slept for too long." Closing her eyes for a moment, composing herself, she then responded, "...Rested. I feel fine, thank you."

Humming in acknowledgement, Unohana watched the young captain beginning to sit upright. "You are completely healed, and have been for some time. What is the last thing you recall?" she asked.

The question froze Suì-Fēng in mid-motion, eyes staring vaguely at the sheets as her mind went back. In her mind's eye, a Hollow creature, much like an Arrancar, bore its haunting reiatsu upon her, soulless white orbs piercing into her being with rage and the desire to kill. She shuddered at the memory, and then frowned as she tried to remember what happened afterwards. The last thing she remembered was...

She looked up at Unohana, continuing to frown. "...The boy...Kurosaki. Is he alive?" she asked, but dreaded the answer.

Wisely keeping a neutral expression on her face with just the hints of sorrow, the healer nodded. "Yes, or so it is believed. However his reiatsu has disappeared and he has not reappeared in his hometown since then," she responded.

The Onmitsukidō commander scowled, looking away. Her mission was a failure, then. How could that have been? She was certain she had the upper hand at that last moment. Closing her eyes, she tried harder to remember...

_"Someone else came..."_

She quirked a brow at Suzumebachi's words. _"Someone? Who?"_

_"...Someone who should _not_ have been there..."_

She inquired more from her zanpakutō, but Suzumebachi went silent. Turning back to Unohana, she opened her eyes. "Someone helped the boy," she said, "though...I don't remember who. It's likely Hakufuku was used."

Nodding, Unohana had figured such. There was a strange reiatsu lingering about the young captain when she was brought into the 4th Division...It was somehow familiar, yet...disturbingly unfamiliar.

Once the 2nd Division captain was up and about, all captains were summoned for a meeting regarding the supposed failed execution of Kurosaki Ichigo. There, discussions of who killed the Onmitsukidō troopers during that time and where Ichigo had gone, as his body was missing, were prevalent. Eventually, after debating the culprits of the killings being any of the many exiles and criminals, it was eventually agreed the Vizards most likely did the deeds, including taking Ichigo away. There were no other orders from the Central 46 but to keep a distant eye on Ichigo's family and friends in case they began to act strangely or give hints to the teen's possible whereabouts.

Also, a certain 12th Division captain was told to keep his curious findings of the Kurosaki children _away_ from the Central 46, at least until their involvement became _necessary_. Interestingly, he had little qualms about this, except of disappointment that he wouldn't be able to do anything with his new discovery...

* * *

The coolness of the oxygen in his mouth registered into Ichimaru's wakening consciousness. The hiss of the respirator and familiar echoic beeps from the monitors came next, followed by a watery resonance he had come to associate with the sound of someone speaking. He remained still, allowing his senses to recover, though somehow his caretaker knew exactly when he regained consciousness.

Slowly, the congestion in his ears cleared, and he could hear his own breathing. He could sense he was once again hooked up to all of his life support, indicating he must have been asleep for a long span of time. He cracked his eye open, vision blurred, and saw the familiar figure sitting beside him in the chair.

"...Urahara..."

There was a heavy sigh before the man responded, "Mr. Ichimaru. I hope you realize you've violated your probation..."

Ichimaru made a soft sound akin to a scoff or curt chuckle. "Is that wha' this's called...?" he slurred in a murmur to himself as his eye closed. They were probably even warier of him than before, not that he minded. "...'Course I do," he acknowledged to Kisuke's statement.

"Why did you do a thing like that? What if you had an attack that left you incapacitated?" Kisuke asked, slowly fanning himself with that damned fan of his.

A lapse of silence ensued as this question took Ichimaru by surprise. He was expecting wary words or something of that nature, not worry. Before answering, he considered the various new reasons why Kisuke was being "nice" to him. "...Then that...would've been it...I guess," he said nonchalantly with just the beginnings of a small shrug. "...Ah...how long've I been out...?"

Not oblivious to the change in topic, the storeowner slightly raised a brow, but said nothing of it. "A few days," he answered.

Figuring such, the albino hummed quietly, somehow still exhausted despite his long slumber.

"Do you want to know how many times you flatlined?"

"Nope."

"...Well...Mr. Kurosaki will live, thanks to your...timely intervention."

Lips quirking by Kisuke's choice of words, he went silent, uninterested in conversation and with nothing else to say, simply content the gnawing, annoying compulsion was over and done with. His caretaker, however, had other ideas.

Kisuke was told of everything that had happened those days ago in Karakura Town, including Yoruichi's deduction that Ichimaru was repaying a debt to Ichigo. Thanks to Ururu, the proposition didn't come as a surprise and Kisuke would have let the entire incident slide were it not for the unnecessary lives taken as a result. An estimate of nine Onmitsukidō troopers were "mysteriously" killed during the time Suì-Fēng was confronting Ichigo, and, despite the obvious suggestion the killing blows were from Hollows, the last troopers to see those killed could only confirm a few were confronting Hollows before they wound up dead. That and, of course, the fact that the troopers weren't _devoured_.

"Regardless of your reasons for helping him, it was unnecessary to have killed members of the Onmitsukidō. They were no match for you and could have been dealt with without bloodshed," he said, calm and stern. Watching his patient carefully, he then asked, "Why did you kill them?"

His eye slanting opening, Ichimaru glanced at him, indifferent. "They were in the way," he said simply, albeit slowly, as if the question confused him, or he regarded it ridiculous.

Frowning, Kisuke flipped his fan over his mouth and nose. The words were said evenly, almost casually, without the slightest twitch of an eye or the smallest suggestion of any other nonverbal emotion. "...That is your justification?" he asked, careful to keep his voice neutral.

"If by that ya mean 'why'd ya kill 'em an' nobody in the past', I was _ordered_ not to kill nobody in the past, unless I was, o'erwise, o' 'course. Now...I can do what I want..." Ichimaru seemed almost content with this, as if a weight was lifted from his shoulders at the realization he could "do what he wanted". After speaking, he closed his eye and continued to rest, but that was fine. His answers were all Kisuke needed to deduce just where he was, mentally.

His initial simple response proved he wouldn't hesitate to kill and would have absolutely no concern for what the reasons were, if there were any, if he had his own. From his manner about it, killing seemed like such a common thing, done so many times, and was perhaps as natural as breathing. To him, there was absolutely nothing wrong with taking someone's life.

Briefly closing his eyes, Kisuke sighed to himself. The man was just as dangerous as he had figured, and then some, as only after the second response did he realize a saddening and unfortunate fact about Aizen's former accomplice...

"Mr. Ichimaru."

"...Yes...?"

Suddenly, the once calculating expression on Kisuke's face turned darkly serious. "I do not trust you, nor do I tolerate a threat to this household. You might not have noticed, but there is a device around your neck that will serve as your aid, alerting of any impending attacks, as well as a monitor," he explained, lowering his fan. "You are no longer permitted to leave the premises of the house without my or Mr. Tessai's explicit permission, is that understood?"

As he spoke, Ichimaru's closed eye had slowly slanted open, shown by the formerly downward crescent somehow seeming to slightly turn upwards. Just as slowly, his lips spread into a wide, face-splitting smile after Kisuke finished speaking. "Like the hauntin' presence o' Death itself, Urahara," he responded with the familiar playful, mocking inflection in his voice he was so known for.

"Also...I want to perform tests on you."

At this, his smile turned to a grin. "Oh? Ya believe me after all?"

Standing, Kisuke responded, "Yes, to an extent. It is at least obvious that you surpass the typical Shinigami. I'd like to find the answers to this myself." He then turned and wordlessly left the room, leaving his patient suddenly alone and lost in his thoughts.

Smiling, Ichimaru looked to the ceiling. Kisuke wasn't too much different from Aizen, after all. No wonder it was so easy to become used to the man's presence...

This thought swept the smile from his face. He then reached up and felt the smooth surface of a collar-like device around his neck. His hand then lowered to his chest, which throbbed at his touch. Slightly grimacing from the sensation, he closed his eye, sighing quietly as his mind wondered to the same dead-end, foreign and melancholic internal conflict Shinsō said his soul screamed of.

What was to happen now...?

How could he go about his intentions from here...?

And...was this so-called "living" worth it?

* * *

**A/N**: Thank you all for the reviews. I'm glad so many are interested in this story. Your various theories as to what is happening to Ichimaru are...intriguing. A little random personal complaint: the next chapter is driving me _up a frigging wall_...so it may not be uploaded during the first week of next month...

Interlude chapters, such as this, will consist of story content with long end-chapter commentary and explanations, perhaps until a forum is created for the series. I currently have five interludes in mind, and they will occur every three chapters or so. Don't bother doing the math; you're wrong, regardless...

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First and foremost, you may have noticed the previous chapter _greatly_ differed from the end scenes parallel to it in **Lenighma**'s prequel story, **Echough [Remix]**. That is because this is version 6 of this story...and that story is a third version created during the time I made version 4 of _this_ fic; that version (4) also contained what is now Echough [Remix]'s Hidden Track. The changes will become even more apparent in the next chapter, but go with the flow. Lenighma intends to make another (yes, _another_) version of both Echo _and_ Echough to make amends to this. They will be considered "special editions", even though calling an "album" of songs a "remix" doesn't make sense (Echo and Echough)...

I've also come to notice I have a wretched habit of using the word "as" too damn much...

When in England, Ichimaru and the others clearly speak English, however, the scene in Karakura Town between Ichimaru and Yoruichi was in English as well. The conversation(s) with Ichigo are, obviously, in Japanese, and unless stated otherwise, so will all conversation with him and those in Japan; Japanese honorifics will be used as an indicator. Names of attacks, locations, etc. from the original source will or might switch between English and their original language(s) in general narration; depends on how I want to emphasize it. Names of people, weapons and zanpakutō will _remain_ in their original language(s) unless used as an explanation (e.g. Ichigo explaining that Shirōgetsu and Zangetsu are his "White Moon" and "Cutting Moon")...

Ichimaru was taken under Aizen's wing at, what, ten years old in human ages? Probably even younger than that. Genius he may have been, Ichimaru was still a child raised by a twisted, devious man. There is no way in hell _something _in his mind was not messed up from that, and it's crucial to take account of his ownindividual self as well. Remember, even before meeting Aizen, he was obviously willing to a) kill people without a shred of hesitance, b) betray his entire world, doing God knows what he's done by doing so, and, to sum it up, c) just about sell his soul to the Devil for his own personal aims, all _at the drop of a hat._ His goal may have been innocent, honorable, even, but..._must_ I go on about this? In his own right, in this fic, he's a twisted bastard more than slightly off-kilter and even he doesn't know how badly so. Thus, take note of his personality and mannerisms throughout the story...It may be a little more than disturbing at times...And, yes, that is a **warning** for future content.

Smart readers know what is in his chest, as it may be a little more than obvious, and the reason I haven't used its real name yet is because...I haven't. You may have also noticed I haven't explained what color his eyes are, though continue to use intense, unsettling adjectivesand heavy emphasis to describe them, i.e. uncanny, "_those_ eyes". There is a legitimate reason for this. As for Shinsō...Ah, dear Shinsō. The very moment I thought of what his zanpakutō would appear as, I thought of two things, aside from female. One was this form; the other was a white female nāga (in this instance called _nāgini_). I'm still debating whether or not to include the latter form, going with that popular element inspired by the _Zanpakutō Unknown Tales_ arc. Though recently I'm speculating on going with something oddly inspired by a demented reimagining of the Cheshire Cat...~

Speaking of which, I've been inspired by a fanart to perhaps give Zangetsu an "animal" form as well, as we always see him in his "human" form...Ideas, anyone...? Huh. I just realized I'm giving away a _ridiculously_ premature spoiler...

There are scenes or lines throughout the story that may change in the future.

...And seriously..._Back-Alley Shoppe_? Couldn't I have come up with _something_ else...?

Ichimaru's collar has the same thickness of a typical collar, like ones with large/medium-sized d-rings. Kinky~

For narration, unless for specific reasons, I've decided to use the characters' first names instead of their last. If you recall, so far I have used only Aizen, Ichimaru and Unohana's last names. Have you figured out why?

On that note, there is also a reason why Ichimaru calls Yoruichi, Tessai, and Kisuke by their last names, and vice-versa. Wouldn't have had Kisuke call Tessai "Mr. Tessai", but...Japanese is one thing, but English is _completely_ different...But at least he isn't calling him and Yoruichi by their last names; Mr. Tessai and Ms. Yoruichi is better than nothing, I suppose...

"Town arrest" just sounds like something Kisuke would say and come up with.

I _am_ doing research for this fic. All of the medical shit I used/am going to be using came from Wikipedia and/or other sources, and the locations used in the UK thus far actually exist, though I will take some liberties with visuals. The _exact_ location of the Back-Alley, is...well, somewhere close enough to Fleetwood for Ichimaru to have gotten there and not go too far to "violate his probation". The best route may be to create a fictional town or street...

The medical shit is "shit" because I'm having a **very** hard time deciding what the _hell_ to use, considering Ichimaru's condition _does not exist_ and he _cannot die_. Intubation, or respirator? And in the future, BVM, or a portable oxygen canister? Tracheal intubation, or not? How the fuck does he move about with the hole in his chest from the chest tube? In the end, I gave up on what to use _for _what I've used thus far. Also, as for how the _hell _he even unhooked himself in the second chapter and during the scene with Ururu in this one...My excuse: he's a genius, he figured it out. Yes, I completely evaded offering a possible explanation.

The -:Edth:C:- breaks separate flashbacks (written in italics between two of those breaks) or other scenes, but not scenes requiring the line breaks, which indicate a completely different location/present time. For instance, having these text breaks between normal narration and the narration of Ichimaru in his inner world...Technically, he's in the same physical location, thus line breaks are not used. Edth:C is an acronym for the name of this fanfic.

If you like the idea of the interludes, please vote on my profile poll:  
1. Yes, they are entertaining and/or informative  
2. No, they are long and/or ruin the pace of the story  
3. Yes; no comment  
4. No; no comment

Thank you for reading~


	5. Snake Tongued Beast

**A/N:** I am alive. Guess what happened? Life happened. College. New job. Seven days a week. A blizzard named Nemo. Three weeks-long case of the flu. Depression. You know how it works...

After over ten versions (no exaggeration) I finally nailed this _accursed_ and very _long _chapter. The only problem is...I'm not there, yet. I have a five month deadline for myself between chapters, and it is May, now. I uploaded the previous chapter around December 4th. Though nowhere near as long as what is deserved (20 pages), here is what I have so far. I don't read many fanfiction, so I have no idea if you still aren't allowed to leave a signed review for a fanfiction chapter more than once, so for your sake and mine...please only leave an anonymous review until this chapter is completed. It's easy, really. If you have Firefox or Chrome, you can open links in new tabs in private/incognito browsing. I do that all the time...Safari has such browsing as well._  
_

Yes, I purposely wrote this chapter's beginning so you wouldn't have to go back to chapter one to know what is going on. If you want...

Enough nervous ranting. Please enjoy what I have so far. It isn't quite perfect, still in "beta", but...I had to upload _something_...

**4. Snake Tongued Beast**

* * *

For the first few weeks after Ichigo's attempted assassination, all who were involved, either directly or indirectly, sensed a sort of uneasy calm settle between the invisible borders that made up their lives. In the world of souls, there was unrest in the Seireitei. Not much was said amongst the Shinigami who were considered friends or close companions once the disappearance of the recently branded criminal became common knowledge, but nothing needed to be said. Mere glances and an awkward silence between them spoke louder than words ever could.

There was no definite reason to mourn, panic or ready for a fight; the Onmitsukidō had reported both the teen's family and friends seemed as reasonably concerned and worried as they should have under normal circumstances of a person's sudden disappearance...much to Suì-Fēng's displeasure. With her still unable to deduce the actual culprit that killed her troopers and prevented her from killing the teen, she was grudgingly forced to consider Kurosaki Isshin had simply returned to his home after his release from the Nest of Maggots. But she wasn't convinced.

The unsaid question formulating in everyone's minds, regardless if Ichigo had been removed from Japan or not, was the same: had he died, or was he alive? And if he was alive...they could only imagine the warring thoughts in his mind.

...In his eyes, had they betrayed him...?

The teenager in question, however, remained comatose. Not a twitch did he make nor a sound did he utter while sleeping under the Vizard's roof as the days turned to weeks. And though a short, blonde Vizard initially said something in disdain for having a human in their midst, no longer could she find a reason to be so obstinately irked by his presence. To the surprise of each of the Vizard once his inborn reiryoku stabilized, instead of having a nonexistent reiatsu, Ichigo had a new one that felt frighteningly familiar, but shouldn't have emitted from him, whatsoever...

In Karakura Town, Ichigo's family, particularly his father, was restless. No longer was Isshin willing to play it safe, shrug off his consternation and apprehension towards the events that had transpired. Though both Karin and Yuzu were informed of Shinigami, Hollows, and the War in the months before, he revealed all and laid himself bare after their brother gave them the short and ugly synopsis just before disappearing. However, as his son had done, he refused to tell them where Ichigo was. For now.

The Kurosaki patriarch's life and the lives of his daughters returned to an uneasy, eerie normalcy, as much as reasonably possible, after Ichigo was covertly placed into the Vizard's care. Though not nearly as worried for them as he had been for Ichigo's well-being, Isshin was concerned for his daughters for more known reason than one. Karin, especially, was beginning to show signs of heightened spiritual powers, though there was nothing unusual about them as of yet. "Yet" being the operative word. In the eyes of the general public who knew the Kurosaki family's situation, there shouldn't have been a reason for concern over what Central 46 might plot. But after a spotlight was literally placed on his son, Isshin's growing paranoia wasn't for naught...

As weeks turned into a month, in a small town in Lancashire, England, the Back-Alley Shoppe household slowly adjusted to their disturbing guest. Taking his "extended probation" all too easily, Ichimaru cooperated without the slightest hints of resistance when Kisuke would perform tests on him. Said tests were brief, somewhat intensive, done at least two times a week and yet the uncanny smile only seemed to grow impossibly wider each and every time.

On the outside, the traitor appeared passive and almost content with his situation. Though still gravely ill, he slowly spent more time awake, even after having an attack. As time wore on, it became increasingly apparent to the three older Shinigami of the household how he could easily give the impression of being unnervingly harmless. One lasting instance of such harmlessness was when he requested writing supplies, unintentionally (or purposely) flaunting just one of his impressive and shockingly docile hobbies. Yet while his fingers worked at such innocent pastimes, something quite the opposite was running through that complex mind of his...

* * *

On the outskirts of a small town in Japan, there was open grassland that surrounded the vast majority of a large, ruined complex building. Once an immense structure over five stories high, most of the sixth and seventh floors were somehow "scooped" out, leaving behind a rugged skeleton of what were once the floors' walls and making the building lean slightly forward. All left behind remained in ruins from the various elements exposed to them over time.

The rumor of the town was that the structure was haunted and or cursed, as over thirty years ago, some demonic creature supposedly attacked it, killing most of the inhabitants. Left behind was what looked akin to a giant footstep imprinted in the ground and rubble on the side of the gaping hole of the sixth and seventh floors. The area would have attracted attention from the locals if not for the dark aura that radiated from it, keeping all away from and nowhere close to the ruins.

The truth, of course, was that a Menos Grande had attacked. Being abandoned and disregarded, it made the perfect hideaway for, say...criminals and exiles of the Soul Society...

The outcast Vizard had discovered the complex years before the attempted assassination on Ichigo's life, before even the War and the public revelation of Aizen's treachery. At the time, they had decided to safeguard the locale for a time they would need it, and one of them had even gone so far as to buy the property to ensure nothing would happen to the structure. Their drastic measures were put to good use after the event months before. Since then, this fantastic building, ruined as it was, had become their new home. It was full of unused rooms, be it the living space was actually underground, massive and comfortable. Each of the Vizard and their guest had their own room, all accessible through the various entranceways from the ruins above, and two large spaces made up the training area and kitchen-cum-dining/living room.

Despite the reasons for their move, they, like Kisuke and his companions, had thoroughly prepared for the worst.

Currently, in the second largest room of the underground living space, a certain incensed, pigtailed Vizard grumbled her opinions. "But he's human," she complained, glaring towards the door to the room the teen in mention slept in. "Why the hell did you tell Isshin his kid would be allowed here no matter what, Shinji?"

For almost as long as the teen had been with them, which was now for a month and nearly two weeks, she had been about this tirade at least once every other day; an improvement since his strange reiatsu became known to them. And so the tall, apron-wearing blonde ignored her as he carried a bag of groceries into the nearby area delegated as the dining room. "Why don't you help me decide what to make for dinner instead of complaining about our guest?" he suggested in passing, expression deadpan.

An instant later, he was airborne, spinning towards the back of the room with the imprint of a sandal on his right cheek. Around him, the others ignored the outburst, going about their lazing.

As he landed in a mangled heap on the floor, Sarugaki Hiyori threw her sandal at him, screaming, "I'm not calling any HUMAN a guest of ours! Bad enough that _Hime _girl was brought to our home before, but this time, he'll be with us for years, possibly!" Clenching her teeth, she once again glared at the door. "...We don't even know if he'll be a Vizard when his powers return."

It was no use trying to placate the short female. They each knew her reasons for reacting so strongly towards whom which they had called one of them not six months before. Perhaps this was just her way of coping...

"...Are you worried about Berry-tan, Hiyori-chan?" Mashiro asked softly, tucking her legs to her chest as she sat on the floor, watched Kensei lifting weights to the side of the room.

Making a sound akin to a scoff, Hiyori turned around, walking towards her room. "...He's not one of us anymore..." she mumbled in response, her voice devoid of any betraying emotions.

Eyes watched her walk out of the room in silence. The moment after she left, from his place on the floor, Hachi commented, "She's worried."

Sitting upright, the left side of his face still a bright red, Shinji sighed in agreement. "...Yeah. I am, too. I think this reiatsu has something to do with what Kisuke said about his soul being damaged. He also said it has nothing to do with his fight with Suì-Fēng."

"...Guess we'll just hope for the best and wait for him to awaken," Love said with his head in his manga, but summing up what everyone was thinking.

They all suddenly flinched, heads snapping into the direction of the room Ichigo slept in, as a darkly familiar reiatsu permeated the air from its direction.

"...What the..."

Shinji, being the closest to the door, was the first to move, swiftly approaching the door and opening it with all intentions to blast the Hollow he surely sensed inside to kingdom come.

Until he realized the reiatsu was coming from the stirring teen upon the bed.

-:Edth:C:-

The moment Ichigo came to consciousness, even with his eyes closed, he felt a dreaded feeling reminiscent of déjà vu. Only this time, there were no soft sounds of voices in the background or whispers within his soul. There was no feeling of reiatsu swirling about him and the world, no comforting presence of Zangetsu within his soul, nor the distinct, distant feeling of some other existence in the depths of his being. Instead, it was quiet.

The world seemed overwhelmingly quiet.

...Though there was something unsettling about...something...off the edges of what he perceived to be his natural senses.

Slowly, ocher eyes fluttered open—

"GAH!"

—wide into eight faces staring at him from above.

"There is a thing called personal space, you bastards!" he exclaimed, well aware he had grasped onto his bed at the rude awakening.

The Vizard's reactions weren't what he had expected, or what was to be expected. They glanced at one another instead of performing some bizarre antic, and then looked back at him. Shinji was the first to break the awkward silence, rubbing the back of his neck.

"So, ah...Ichigo. How ya feeling?" he asked with predictable nonchalance.

Brows furrowing, Ichigo blinked at the question. Slowly, he was brought back to his present situation, why he was in the presence of the Vizard to begin with. His expression only slightly dropped when it all fell into place. "Startled, but fine, no thanks to you guys," he lightly retorted.

That response didn't rouse a typical response, either. "No, really," Love urged, "how do you feel?"

His expression deepening, this time Ichigo took a moment before responding. In the same moment, that unsettling feeling of some force or dense, undetectable object above him came to his attention, causing him to wince away. "...It feels like there's something heavy between us, something invisible," he said cautiously, "but everything else feels...normal..."

His gaze momentarily hazed over at his word choice. Normal. That word now carried more weight than what he once thought possible. Normal. How long had it been since he last felt...normal?

Blinking out of his contemplation, he noticed the faces of distrust at his words. "Yeah. Right. Normal," Kensei scoffed, moving back and crossing his arms while giving the teen a wary glare.

All at once, they began conversation, completely ignoring the startled teen:

"Think it's his Hollow?" Hiyori asked, glancing over at Shinji.

He glanced back. "Eh, I don't think so."

"I agree," said Hachigen, nodding wisely. "I think we would know if it was."

"His reiatsu isn't dark enough, anyhow," Lisa added tersely.

"Oi..."

Rose cracked a small smile. "I think we should have anticipated this."

"Why do I get the feeling you're right?" Love sighed.

"Oi...!"

Mashiro poked Kensei's side. "I think Berry-tan is—"

He swatted her hand away. "Don't poke me!"

"OI!"

The ex-Shinigami moved back, giving the teen his space and looking at him just when he abruptly sat upright, glaring darkly at them.

"Don't talk about me like I'm not here!" he exclaimed, momentarily ignoring the strange dense sensation distancing itself from him when they moved away. "And someone tell me what the hell is going o—?"

"You don't feel _normal_, Ichigo," Lisa interjected, getting straight to the point. She then adjusted her glasses, hiding her eyes, causing the light in the room to reflect off of them. "In fact, you shouldn't have any reiatsu for us to sense at all..."

Eyes slightly widening, he quickly glanced to each of them, seeing they were serious about the matter. He took a moment, and then looked down at his hands, sighing and frowning in slight disappointment. It was just one strange thing after another with him, wasn't it? "...What do I feel like, then?" he asked, his voice soft, almost resigned. "You said something about my Hollow, but I don't sense anything."

Briefly glancing away, Shinji raised a brow in thought, mentally searching for the right words. He finally settled on, "Dark. You feel like something...dark. Similar to a Hollow, I guess." He shrugged. "Can't really think of any other way to explain it."

"I was thinking maybe your Hollow was doing some weird shit," Hiyori bluntly explained to the teen's latter statement. She then crossed her arms, scoffing in what appeared to be disappointment. "But that's obviously not it, so what's the deal, baldy?"

Glaring at her, Ichigo growled, "How the hell am I supposed to know?! You're the ones giving off some weird aura!"

She scoffed. "So are you!"

"About that," said Rose, focusing back to the main subject, "can you elaborate on it?"

Sighing, Ichigo shook his head, looking back to and flexing his fingers. Before verbally answering, he tried to reach out and detect the sensation, but it was difficult without some sort of "marker", or what would have otherwise been reiatsu. Though unable to sense anything else, the distinct awareness of some presence to his side, where the Vizard stood, still lingered. It was quite different from reiatsu, however; hollow.

"It's hard," he murmured, brows furrowed in concentration. "The best way I can describe it is that it's kind of disturbing."

Humming in thought, Hachigen took a step forward, causing the teen to visibly twitch and slant his eyes. "Interesting reaction," he observed. "It worsens as we approach."

"Yeah."

"No wonder you jumped like a sissy when you woke up," Hiyori jeered.

"Shut up."

"But is it just us," Rose pondered aloud, "or normal humans as well?"

Tilting his head towards the door, Shinji turned halfway to it. "Guess we'll find out. C'mon, Ichigo," he beckoned, grinning widely. "Come see your new home."


End file.
